Strawberry Jam

Earlier in the summer we made 3 separate trips to our local strawberry farm. The weather was so pleasant and a few mornings spent picking yielded some stellar berries and homemade jam.

Claire carried her own basket and was a great picker! She refused to eat any insisting they were all for her basket, what a change from last year!

We wound up with enough jam to pass along some to our neighbors and friends and I thought it would be nice for Claire to help with the labels. We used Pomona’s Universal Pectin which allowed us to make a low sugar version of freezer jam. It requires one extra step (making calcium water) but I think the results are far better then the super-sweet versions with pectin that require sugar to jell them.

Next year I’m going to get more adventurous and try some savory jellies and maybe even some real canning so we don’t lose valuable freezer space to these jars.

The freezer jam keeps in the freezer for one year and the fridge for 2 weeks.I wonder if it will all last that long, we’ve been enjoying ours on bread and scooped into some yogurt and cottage cheese. Yum!